Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio said
Friday that Premier Mario Draghi's government is unlikely to
survive the current crisis it is enveloped in.
Draghi presented his resignation to President Sergio Mattarella
on Thursday after the 5-Star Movement (M5S), a key part of the
ruling coalition, failed to back the government in a confidence
vote in the Senate.
Mattarella refused to accept the resignation and told Draghi to
report to parliament and assess the situation, something the
premier is set to do on Wednesday.
But Draghi has said he is unwilling to continue with his
national unity government without the M5S, so Mattarella's move
may have just delayed the inevitable.
There are various possible outcomes if the Draghi executive does
collapse, but several political commentators see the most likely
being that parliament will be dissolved and early elections will
take place within months.
"It would be right for the Draghi government and the coalition
to continue, but at the moment I see that as highly unlikely,"
Di Maio told RTL radio.
Di Maio is the former head of the M5S but he recently left the
movement to form his own centrist party, Together for the Future
(IPF), after a row over M5S leader and ex-premier Giuseppe
Conte's opposition to Italy sending more weapons to Ukraine.
He blasted his former group as "irresponsible".
"Conte's party, which is no longer the M5S, decided not to
support the confidence vote and the premier, a man of his word,
resigned as he said he would," Di Maio said.
"Unless there is an act of maturity from the parties in the next
few hours, we risk no longer having a government on Wednesday
and there will be early elections.
"And this will be a serious problem for the country.
"With parliament dissolved, we'll have a provisional
administration that won't have the power to approve the budget
(for 2023).
"We'll see what happens with the bond spread in the coming
hours.
"We certainly won't be able to handle the gas-price cap (the
Draghi government has been calling for at the EU level).
"The procedures to implement the National Recovery and
Resilience Plan (NRRP or PNRR) will stop".
Conte has been at the centre of tension within the ruling
alliance for months.
The ex-premier had recently presented Draghi with a list of
demands he said the M5S wanted to be met in order to stay in the
executive.
On Tuesday Draghi showed willingness to reach agreement on some
of these issues, including a demand for the introduction of a
minimum wage.
But he also stressed that the sense of his government of
national unity would be 'lost" if the parties supporting it
started to lay down ultimatums.
The M5S rebelled over a decree including a measure on plans for
a waste-to-energy plant in Rome, something it opposes.
Conte said that others were to blame for the M5S's decision not
to take part in Thursday's confidence vote.
"The M5S gave its support from the start to this government...
with the cornerstones of the ecological transition and social
justice," Conte told reporters.
"If then you have blackmail in which measures contrary to the
ecological transition enter a decree, we will never give our
vote.
"Those who forced things in this way they should take
responsibility (for what has happened)".
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